Method of making collars



1958 T. D. AINSLIE 2,845,688

METHOD OF MAKING COLLARS Filed March 2. 1955 INVENTOR ATTORN EY UnitedStates METHOD OF MAKING COLLARS Thomas Dow Ainslie, Metuchen,

Phillips-Jones Corporation, ration of New York N. J., assignor to NewYork, N. Y., a corpo- This invention relates to the manufacture ofcollars, and particularly to the type of collar usually employed on mensshirts. One of the objects of the invention is to provide a method andmeans by which these collars can be easily manufactured in a manner toinsure a wellmade, inexpensive and uniform product.

At the present time, collars of the type to which the present inventionrelates, are made from a lengthy web or strip of textile fabric ofrelatively narrow width, approximately the width of the collars whichare made from this strip. The strip might be said to be ribbonlike inWidth.

The bleaching, dyeing, and other processing of a narrow-width fabric ofthis kind is such as to often require special apparatus and treatment,as distinguished from the treatment and processing of wide piece goods,such as that from which shirts are made. As a result, care mustbeexercised in the processing of the strips of fabric from which thecollars are made, in order to insure uniformity of appearance andcoloring, and to provide a match with the shirting from which the shirtsare made and to which the collars are to be attached.

It is accordingly an object of the present invention to provide a meansand method for producing collars, and in which a plurality ofcollar-width sections of the fabric shall be integrally joined in theform of a relatively wide piece of fabric which can be unitarilyhandled, bleached, dyed or otherwise treated by apparatus and methodsemployed for the treatment of shitting or any other relatively widetextile sheet material.

It has also been found that when the collars are produced fromnarrow-width strips or from independent ribbon-like tapes or webs offabric, and which webs are provided along one marginal edge with areashaving a reduction in threads, to thereby produce a fold line area forthe collars, there is a tendency for such narrow strips to distort in amanner to cause the edge of the fold line area to depart from straightand to assume a curved line. This warpage of the strip requires specialhandling when the narrow fabric is processed if the arc is to bemaintained reasonably constant. Otherwise, it will be pulled out,causing excessive distortion of the collar after Washing.

It is therefore another object of the invention to provide a fabricpiece in which a plurality of the collarproducing strips are integrallyarranged in side-by-side relationship, with the fold line area on onestrip in juxtaposition to the fold line area on the adjacent strip, thusplacing the so-called top-edge portion of one strip in juxtaposition tothe top-edge of an adjacent strip. This arrangement is such that thetendency of any one strip in the multi-strip piece of fabric tolaterally distort will be resisted by its neighboring strips, so thatthe strips, when separated from the piece by a slitting machine, will bestraight and true and devoid of lateral warpage.

It is still another object of the invention to provide a method ofmaking collars in which a plurality of relatively narrowcollar-producing strips are simultaneously woven in the form of a widefabric piece, with the strips thereof arranged in side-by-siderelationship and separated by elongated bands of reduced-threadincorporation, and through which areas separation of the strips iseffected to thus provide each strip with a longitudinal marginal edgeportion constituting a fold line area for the collars subsequentlyfabricated from the strip.

With these and other objects to be hereinafter set forth in view, I havedevised the arrangement to be described and more particularly pointedout in the claim appended hereto.

In the accompanying drawing, wherein all illustrative embodiment of theinvention is disclosed,

Fig. l is a face view of a strip of fabric of the character used at thepresent time for the fabrication of shirt collars;

Fig. 2 is a face view of a section of the wide pieces from which thecollar strips are to be made in accordance with the present invention,and

Fig. 3 shows one of the strips produced from the fabric shown in Fig. 2.

In Fig. 1 is shown a short section of the lengthy, relatively narrowstrip of woven textile fabrics from which one piece collars for shirtsare made from at present. Such strip is usually about three inches inwidth and is selvaged along both of its longitudinal edges as indicatedat 2 and 3. Adjacent to one of these longitudinal edges is provided anarea indicated at 4 which constitutes the fold line area for the collar.This area usually contains less threads than the remainder of the stripin order to facilitate the folding down of the collar on a lineextending along said area.

When strips are made in the narrow form just described, specialapparatus must be provided for handling them and applying the bleaching,dyeing and other treatments, as distinguished from the similar treatmentof wide piece goods. Moreover, it has been found that such narrow stripsexhibit a tendency to warp or curve, so that as a result, the stripdeviates from straight and this is detrimental to collar production.

In the embodiment of the invention as disclosed in Fig. 2, the stripsfrom which the collars are produced, are integrally joined in connectedside-by-side relation, in the form of a wide sheet or piece of fabric 5,a relatively small section of which is shown in the drawing. The fabricsheet is divided at equally-spaced intervals by bands 8 ofreduced-thread content, which bands, when split longitudinally andcentrally along the dividing lines indicated at 10, produce thefold-line areas 11 for the tops of two adjacent strips, one of which isshown in Fig. 3. The dividing-line, down the centers of the foldlineareas 8, is defined by narrow webs 9 of very materially-reduced threadcontent, thus facilitating the slitting of the fabric along these lines.

Located alternately to the bands 8 are relatively narrow bands 7, whichare also adapted to be slit lengthwise on the lines 10, to produce theedgings along that edge of the collar which is known in the trade as thetop edge, but in reality is the lower edge of the collar when the sameis in its turned-down position of wear attached to the shirt.

When the sheet fabric 5 is slit along the lines 10, and this is easilydone by a slitting machine of any known type, a plurality of theseparated strips 6 will result. This separation of the sheet 5 into thestrips 6 is done after the sheet 5 is bleached, dyed or otherwisesubjected to treating processes so that any effect that such treatmentsmight have on the fabric will be had while the fabric is in the piece asdistinguished from the separate narrow strips in which it is usuallytreated. Hence, when the strips are severed from the sheet they havebeen treated so the possibility of the strips warping or deviating fromthe straight by treatment will be very materially decreased.

After the strips are cut out from the sheet, they appear as shown inFig. 3, and the methods normally followed in producing the collars fromthese strips can then be pursued in the usual manner.

By weaving the strips in the single wide piec'e, as :shown in Fig. 2,with an arrangement in which the 015 area of one strip is injuxtaposition to the foldarea of the ad-. jacent strip and with thesecond edge of a strip adjacent to the second edge of the next strip, afurther resistance to distortion of the several strips in the sheettakes place. Therefore, again an advantage of producing the strips inintegral connection and in side-by-side relation in a wide piece, ispresent.

While I have herein shown in'Fig. 2, only a few of the strips 6 inconnected relation in the sheet, it is to he understood that this isonly illustrative, since the sheet may be made very wide, havingpossibly a dozen or more strips according to the capability of the looms:on which the fabric is made, or the facilities at hand for thesubsequent slitting of the wide piece.

Having described a single embodiment of the invention,

'it is obvious that the same is not to be restricted thereto butis broadenough tocover allstructures coming within the scope of the annexedclaim.

What I claim is:

The method of making collars consisting in weaving a relatively widepiece of textile fabric in a manner to produce in said piece a pluralityof equally-spaced, parallel division bands of reduced-thread content,severing the fabric 'd'ownthe longitudinal center line of each of thebands to thereby separate the piece into a plurality of strips, each ofsaid strips having at one of its longitudinal edges a portion of thereduced-thread band to thereby provide an easily-foldable, top-edge areaalong the upper edge of each 'of the collars to be'formed from eachstrip, and in cutting collars from each strip in a manner to incorporatealong the top edge of each of the collars the reduced-thread portion ofthe band.

References Cited in the file of this patent UNITED STATES PATENTS

